Given the situation between Russia and Ukraine, could we finally stop gushing over Angela Merkel’s brilliance at realpolitik?
She’s put the majority of the largest continental economy in NATO directly into the hands of Vladimir Putin. Over half of German energy is now supplied by Russia, with the failure of Germany’s green energy initiative and the attendant dismantling of Germany’s once awesome nuclear power capability. Germany’s economy can be thrown into a cataclysmic depression with the turning of a couple of valves.
Thus, NATO’s largest continental economy and military is at Putin’s dubious mercy.
Germany has to be calculating that if it participates in harsh sanctions against Russia, it makes itself vulnerable to Russian countermeasures. Already, Russia has been squeezing Europe’s gas supplies. It’s not at all clear that Germany would give up on the pipeline even if Russian tanks roll for Kyiv.
The Germans, meanwhile, aren’t willing to make even the slightest gesture toward deterring Russia. They are blocking Estonia, a fellow NATO ally, from sending howitzers to Ukraine that originated in Germany.
Why it’s almost as if this is another thing Trump was right about.
Not to worry, Mitch. CNN reports US working with allies to shore up energy supplies if Russia invades Ukraine and shuts off the valves. Lesko Brandon is asking other nations to step up and deliver.
Not the US, though. We have none to spare. “Shipments of Russian crude oil to the US in 2021 averaged 202,000 b/d, the highest in 11 years, according to data from S&P Global Platts trade-flow analytics tool cFlow. Most of these imports consist of Russian export grades, such as Urals, ESPO Blend and Varandey . . . according to data from the US Energy Information Administration . . . .The US is now importing higher volumes from Russia than it is from key ally Saudi Arabia.”
Under Trump, we were a net exporter of oil. Under Biden, we’re a net importer, and mostly from Russia. Which means Lesko Brandon is a good customer of Putin, and that explains why Putin will listen to Brandon and take his advice to leave the Ukraine alone.
After all, Putin wouldn’t be dumb enough to offend his best customers simply to achieve world domination. Would he?
Once a commie, always a commie?
Germany offered Ukraine helmets as their NATO contribution. I wonder if they were of the pickelhaube variety. That says just about everything about the viability of NATO. It should be dissolved, but not before non-US participants are ordered to dismantle Turtle Bay property. By hand. No tools.
In the meantime, the adults in the WH are firing unjabbed servicemen while simultaneously beating the war drums. Drums that even Ukraine wants nothing to do with! Brilliant! That’s realpolitik right there!
Actually, the US and its allies must do what they can to engineer a diplomatically and politically acceptable way out of this for Putin. If he has to choose between humiliation or invading Ukraine everyone knows which option he will go for.
Macron and other European leaders get this and are mature enough to understand that this situation cannot be solved on a “we win — they lose” basis. If Russia invades Ukraine everyone without exception loses, some more than others, but there will be no winners.
MBerg wrote: “Given the situation between Russia and Ukraine, could we finally stop gushing over Angela Merkel’s brilliance at realpolitik?”
Merkel was a scientist and well understood that the advances in nuclear technology made it the preferable option. And add in that she knew Putin very well, having come from East Germany, spoke fluent Russian. You think she just made a mistake or was she just another puppet.
^ They already did. If Putin just takes a little of Ukraine, it’s OK.
Merkel was a scientist and well understood that the advances in nuclear technology made it the preferable option
Odd then that the last of the six remaining nuclear power plants were closed or scheduled to be during her last years as prime minister. Please explain.
The New York Slimes is actually blaming Republicans for the confusion in the gropey joe administration as regards Ukraine.
No, really: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/26/us/politics/republicans-ukraine.html
They even name drop Tucker Carlson. Lol. our corporate mediots.
@jdm
Not quite. Fukushima happened right before state elections in Baden-Wuerttemberg where the Greens were about to win, defeating Merkel’s party. Merkel “the tactician” used the public short-term fear (it was not a backlash) immediately after Fukushima for domestic political motives and announced that all of a sudden the risks from nuclear had become too high. For some reason Germans still believe that thousands died because of the nuclear incident. In fact, only one person died, but the tsunami killed 20,000. Merkel “the scientist” had actually extended the life of Germany’s nuclear reactors only a couple of months before Fukushima —stressing that it did not make sense to switch off a CO2 neutral energy source ahead of the operating life cycle of the reactors. The premature end of nuclear energy is about political maneuvering gone horribly wrong. Merkel’s party lost the state back in 2011 (CDU is a fring party there) and Germany — with per capita CO2 emissions double those of France — depends on Russian energy imports and burning lignite (CO2 wise the worst energy source out there).
The Greens are in many respects more Luddite than rational.
Overall this fixation with Germany is a distraction, the country is irrelevant in the current crisis. Nothing Germany does or doesn’t will have any impact on Moscow. Of course it would help to not cause embarrassment, Ukraine might as well sell these German helmets on ebay and buy a couple of AK 47s. Russia always wanted to negotiate exclusively with the US and it looks like its troup movements have achieved exactly that. Superpower diplomacy as in the Cold War. Russia is Biden’s problem now.